Business: New Driver for The Laggard

Fast start, but not for AMC

While publicly professing their usual optimism, Detroit automakers for
the past few weeks have been holding their breath. Their $6 billion
investment in retooling for new models that have been sharply reduced
in size and weight (TIME, Aug. 1) represented a gamble: Would the
public like the smaller "big" cars? Last week the carmakers could relax
a bit and repeat previous predictions of near record sales during the
1978 model-year with more conviction. New-car sales for the first 20
days of October—during which time most of the new models were in the
showrooms—jumped...